A monument to conservation

Nature lover dedicates ninth windmill in Broward, and wants to build more

July 19, 2008|By Linda Trischitta Staff Writer

DEERFIELD BEACH — Galvanized steel blades of a new 14-foot-tall windmill reflected the sun Friday as a merry gent who let ladybugs crawl on him dedicated the ninth wind machine he has erected in Broward County.

"If you have the right vision and the right partners, you can accomplish amazing stuff," said Roy Rogers, 71. The Lighthouse Point resident, accompanied by his wife, Mandy, saluted Jan Moran and JM Family Enterprises for funding the $21,500 windmill that sits near their headquarters and casts breezes over a butterfly garden planted by children from the city's Boys & Girls Club.

Before setting loose an orange and black Monarch butterfly, Rogers let the insect's legs tickle the noses of the kids and officials like City Manager Michael Mahaney and Vice Mayor Sylvia Poitier.

Throughout 22 years, Rogers has placed windmills around Weston, Davie and Coconut Creek with partners IBI Group's Green Team and financial supporters. The Deerfield windmill is the first of 33 Rogers wants to place along Interstate 95 in Broward County.

"There is no one like Roy," said Florida Department of Transportation District Secretary Jim Wolfe, who helped Rogers accomplish the installation on DOT property at the northwest corner of Hillsboro Boulevard and I-95. "There is no reason there couldn't be 33. I know there are more in the works."

Rogers persevered four years on his latest project, a habit practiced during his career. He dropped out of high school, earned an equivalency degree and enlisted in the U.S. Navy, becoming a navigator on nuclear submarines that lurked beneath polar ice during the Cold War.

"There is nothing like a dose of deprivation from nature to breed appreciation," Rogers said, explaining his love for bugs and flowers. "When you shut that hatch and go under for two-and-a-half months at a time, can you imagine what it was like to see the sun, feel the wind in your face and see the color green again?"

The planning consultant, who has served on the state ethics commission and as an officer of the Florida Audubon Society and The Nature Conservancy, has fostered 80 butterfly gardens in Broward County.

After the military, he joined Arvida-JMB Partners and helped develop Weston. How does a man with his environmental credentials reconcile turning 25 square miles of Everglades into a town?

"The two can co-exist, and I'm proof positive," Rogers said. "You don't get to do that kind of thing [lead environmental advocacy groups] without being what you purport to be."

Rogers said that the portion of Everglades landscape that became Weston had already been altered by imported exotic plant species, State Road 84 and U.S. Route 27. "It was conservation done the right way ... it was better than it would have been if we had we not developed Weston," he said, citing the city's parks and environmental consciousness as his legacy.

A grandfather 15 times over, Rogers waxes romantic when it comes to windmills.

"It's a good-guy icon, and it's wholesome and wonderful and triggers an understanding of resource conservation," he said.

Linda Trischitta can be reached at ljtrischitta@sun-sentinel.com or 954-356-4233.

Global view

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